Vice President Al Gore announced last week that the first
center to study the effect of pesticides on children will be
established at Berkeley as part of a federally funded
initiative focusing on children's health.

The center will be one of eight new research centers
funded by the Environmental Protection Agency and the
Department of Health and Human Services, each of which will
study how the health of children is affected by
environmental exposures.

At Berkeley, Brenda Eskenazi, a professor at the School
of Public Health, and her collaborators will focus on
pesticide exposure in the children of California farm
workers. The School of Public Health has received a $1.18
million award for this work, according to a White House
press release.

Eskenazi, professor of maternal and child health and
epidemiology, has studied for 20 years the developmental and
reproductive effects of chemical exposures, such as dioxins
and pesticides, caffeine and tobacco smoke.

"Recent preliminary studies show young children can be
exposed to pesticides from residues in their food, as well
as from their normal exploration of their environment," said
Eskenazi. Farm worker children, she added, may be exposed to
even higher levels as a result of pesticide drift, tainted
breast milk, playing in the fields or tracking pesticides
into their homes.

The White House press release said the goal of the
centers is to "address two of the most important areas of
children's environmental health -- the causes of asthma and
the effects of pesticide exposure."

At five of the centers researchers will examine links
between the rise in asthma rates and secondhand smoke, smog
and other pollutants. The three other centers will
investigate children's vulnerabilities to pesticides, which
can affect the endocrine system, reduce intellectual
development and damage the central nervous system.

Pesticide exposure is the focus of the Berkeley center
because "children are small, and we have no idea how these
chemicals are metabolized in small bodies," Eskenazi said.
"We know nothing about whether there are health effects from
chronic, low-level pesticide exposure in children."

California uses more pesticides than any other state --
40 percent of the nationwide total -- so there is a
particular concern about exposure in this state, said
Eskenazi.

"California is also unique because it is the only state
where pesticide use is tracked," she said.

Eskenazi said preventing illness in children is of great
concern to farm communities and growers, who will reap the
benefits of the studies. What is learned also will suggest
risk factors for children not living in agricultural
settings.

At the Berkeley center, the School of Public Health will
collaborate with Children's Hospital of Oakland; the
California Department of Health Services; the California
Environmental Protection Agency; Stanford University; the
Alameda and Monterey health departments, La Clinica de Salud
del Valle de Salinas and La Natividad Medical Center, both
in Salinas, Calif.; Centers for Disease Control; and the
Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio, Texas.

In addition to the federal research center at Berkeley,
the other seven centers will be at the University of
Southern California's School of Medicine; the University of
Iowa's College of Medicine; the University of Michigan's
School of Public Health; Johns Hopkins University's
Children's Center; the University of Washington's Department
of Environmental Health; Mount Sinai School of Medicine, in
New York; and Columbia University's School of Public Health,
also in New York. The EPA and the HHS has allocated $10.6
million for the centers, which were selected through an
extensive peer review process by health experts in and out
of government.

President Bill Clinton issued the Executive Order on the
Protection of Children from Environmental Health Risks and
Safety Risks on April 21, 1997, making children's
environmental health a federal priority.